Jewellery has been with humanity since the beginning as people have always felt the need to adorn themselves for a variety of reasons including a sense of individuality, beauty and simply as a means of attracting attention. Jewellery is a multi-billion dollar worldwide business.
The ability to interchange, personalize and accessorize has always been a facet of the jewellery industry. It is an innate human desire to transform an item from an object one has purchased to an object that resonates with the owners personality, clothing or current moods. In modern times many different people have brought forward ideas to aid people in accomplishing this.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,427,487 to Morgan, 5,414,948 to Kudo, 6,588,067 to Efron et al., 6,026,658 to Weller, 4,374,470 to Isaacson, and 6,742,359 to Takessian, all disclose jewellery items with interchangeable inserts. Each of these jewellery items requires manipulation of moving or moveable parts in order to change and secure an insert.
Use of opposite polarized magnetic elements to join components is known in the field. For example, permanent magnets can be used to hold two jewellery components which are made of different types of precious metals and stones.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,013,674 to Kretchmer, and 6,851,279 to Hargrove, US patent applications 2006/0137396 by Ma, and 2006/0075781 by Kretchmer et al., describe jewellery items which include one or more magnets providing attractive force between the jewellery components.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,409,837 to Robert Smith describes an interchangeable jewellery insert for detachable attachment to a receptacle, the insert comprises a body with an end having at least one dimension sized to fit within a receiving aperture of the receptacle. The other end of the insert has at least one dimension larger than an inward extension of the receiving aperture. The insert has an extension formed of elastic material and coupled to the body. The extension is a closed continuous circuit along a periphery of the body, and extends outward and is deformed by the inward extension of the receptacle. The extension frictionally engages a surface of the receiving aperture.
The jewellery insert of an interchangeable jewellery may be difficult to exchange as the magnetic force attracting the jewellery components may be quite strong, especially where permanent, rare earth magnets are used.
For non-magnetic interchangeable jewellery items, frictional engagement between the insert and the receptacle is generally required. This may have the dual disadvantages that the use may need a rod-like instrument, such as a pen, to remove the insert from the receptacle, and that a strict manufacturing requirement for the dimension of the parts is needed. This requirement also results in the absence of any movement freedom for the insert within the receptacle which may be a desired feature for the consumer.
Accordingly, there is a need for improvement of an interchangeable jewellery insert that can be conveniently attached to or detached from a jewellery item.